Garden & Gun Announces Made In The South Awards Winner

November 18, 2010 – Charleston, SC – Garden & Gun is pleased to announce the winners of the first annual Made in the South Awards – a celebration of the rich cultural tradition of craft, design and ingenuity in small, Southern-based businesses. This summer, entries were accepted in five categories: Food, Home, Style, Sporting, and Etc. (a place for those businesses that don’t fit squarely into the other categories) and submissions from Louisiana to Virginia flooded the magazine’s office located in historic Charleston, SC.

“We are excited to share the winner and runners-up of Garden & Gun’s Made in the South Awards. The South has long been lauded for the creative spirit and entrepreneurial drive that its people possess. Some of the best products you’ve never heard of are made in the South, and our goal was to bring more of those products to the public. The awards are about people who are making things that have character, integrity, a great story and, most importantly, Southern style – traits that are truly embodied by our selections,” says G & G Editor-in-chief Sid Evans.

Garden & Gun assembled a prestigious panel of judges (including James Beard Award-winning chef Robert Stehling, Design Sponge founder Grace Bonney, G&G contributor and avid sportsman Donovan Webster and best-selling author and style arbiter Julia Reed) to choose the winners and a selection of deserving runners-up featured in the December/January 2011 issue.

Former home builder and woodworker Jay Lichty from Tryon, North Carolina, takes top brass as this year’s overall Made in the South Awards winner (Etc. category) for his line of handmade guitars and ukuleles. A little over a year after starting his own business, Lichty Guitars is growing quickly. His hand-crafted instruments are made from exotic woods, used by more than a few notable musicians, and generally considered small works of art.

Lichty will receive a trip to the G&G headquarters in Charleston for a business consultation with Leapfrog Public Relations and Stitch Design Co. – Southern firms known for bringing national attention and sophisticated style to small businesses based in the Southeast.

Also profiled in the December/January 2011 issue are the four winners in each remaining category. For Food, Rooibee Red Tea (Louisville, KY) was chosen by for their delicious brews of tasty organic teas. In Sporting, Oyster Fly Rods (Blue Ridge, GA) are featured for their incredible beauty and performance on the water. The Home winner is Lowcountry Originals (Bluffton, SC) for their locally-sourced lighting collection. And finally, the Style winner is Emil Erwin (Nashville, TN) and his made-by-hand canvas bag collection.

As an exclusive opportunity to the Made in the South Awards winners, online boutique Taigan.com will feature virtual storefronts with a selection of product offerings for easy online purchasing. Shop now because the online boutiques will be live for a limited time.

About Garden & Gun Magazine:

Garden & Gun is a Southern Lifestyle Magazine that’s all about the magic of the New South – The sporting culture, the food, the music, the art, the literature, the people, and the ideas. It espouses a strong conservation ethic that grows out of its connection to the land, and it reveals the beauty of the South as no magazine ever has. GARDENANDGUN.COM